From the liner notes to ...
Dvořák: Slavonic Dances Opp. 46 and 72 (Four-Hand Piano Music Vol. 2)
Performed by Silke-Thora Matthies and Christian Köhn
Catalog no. 8.553138 on the Naxos label
Original text by Teresa Pieschacón Raphael, 1996
Translated from German by Matt Shelburne
“The fellow has more ideas than any of us. Everyone else could make main themes out of his waste material,” declared Johannes Brahms when the compositions of an unknown Czech composer fell into his hands in 1875. Fascinated by the work of the young Antonín Dvořák, who came from a small town near Prague on the banks of the Moldau, Brahms immediately had him come to Vienna and arranged for him to receive a state scholarship. For the then 36-year-old Dvořák who was eking out a meager existence as a music teacher and orchestra director at the Prague Theater, heaven had just opened forth. He was finally lifted out of his financial worries—at least to a certain degree—and could devote himself totally to composition. His already impressive output (five symphonies, a few operas as well as an abundance of chamber music) was only known to a few friends, and at last he would be permitted to gain a foothold in the broader musical world.
With Brahms’ patronage, that would not take long. Not only did Brahms offer friendship to his protégé, he negotiated on his behalf with Simrock, the internationally influential publisher. After the sweeping success of his Moravian Duets, Simrock asked Dvořák for a piece for four-hand piano similar to Brahms’ Hungarian Dances. Dvořák went to work: in scarcely two months (from March 18th to May 7th, 1878) he composed eight Slavonic Dances, Op 46: heart-refreshing new piano sounds from the East which made him a famous man practically overnight. They sold so well that Dvořák orchestrated them the same year.
“At last, here is a complete and indeed totally natural talent,” raved the music critic Ludwig Ehlert on November 15th, 1878 in the Berlin National Newspaper. He continued: “A heavenly naturalness floods this music, which is why it is thoroughly popular. There is no trace of brooding or contrivance in it … I would find it blissful if just one more musician came along over whom one had as few objections as over the arrival of spring.” Even the old Bedřich Smetana, who is said to have been jealous over his countryman’s sudden fame, unreservedly praised Dvořák when the score was brought before him at his request (“The younger Mister Composers should at least show the old Smetana their work”).
The publisher Simrock soon pressed for a second series in the style of Op 46. However, Dvořák, busy with the oratorio Saint Ludmila until the end of May, 1886, let his publisher know that he was “not in the right mood to think about such music.” In the summer of 1886, the composer delivered the desired installment with the Slavonic Dances, Op 72: eight more masterpieces which, in their melodic, rhythmic, and tonal inventiveness, spoke from Dvořák’s innate consonance with true folklore. In contrast to Brahms, the champion of folk songs, Dvořák had no need to turn to times gone by. He carried in his heart and ears the current melodies that were still sung and danced in the countryside. Although these pieces might be perceived as specimens of Czech and other Slavic dances, Dvořák created the melodies himself, endowing them with compositional sophistication, nevertheless without losing their “heavenly naturalness.”
In the first set of Slavonic Dances, Bohemian-Moravian types of dances predominate—dance forms which are also varied upon in Dvořák’s symphonic and chamber music. Mind you, he didn’t title the individual dances, so we must rely on the classification by the Prague music critic and Dvořák biographer Otakar Sourek. The Furiant appears twice in the first collection: at the beginning and at the end, as the first and eighth dances. This form is a rhythmically biting dance, recognized by a three-two and a three-four meter. The Dumka appears as the second dance: a Ukrainian dance which arises from the alternation between fast and elegiac segments, and which Dvořák liked to use in slow movements. The third dance is derived from the Bohemian Polka; the fourth and sixth dances follow the easy-going, minuet-like Sousedská. The fifth and seventh dances are in the form of a Skočná, a Czech jumping dance.
From the beginning of June until the 9th of July, 1886, Dvořák worked on the second set of Slavonic Dances, Op 72 (1-8). During his work he had reported “that they [will] sound like the Devil” and were “of a totally different form” than the first collection. Indeed, here Dvořák applied strong harmonic and thematic contrasts; the construction of the dances appears richer, freer, and more multifaceted. His selection of folk dances pulls in Slovak, Serbian, and Polish forms. The series is introduced with a Slovak Odzemek, a wild shepherd’s dance, which is followed by another Dumka. The third dance is devoted to the aforementioned jumping dance, the Skočná. For the fourth dance, the Ukrainian Dumka appears again. After a Spačirka comes a Polish Mazurka as the sixth dance, and for the seventh a Kolo, a round dance of Yugoslavian and Bulgarian origin. A Sousedská rounds off the set.